No Way Back
by mulierositas
Summary: What seemingly started out as an ordinary day at William McKinley would soon turn out to be anything but. In an instant every students worries about school and homework would be immediately pushed to the back of their brain, replaced by only one thing: The need to survive. At the end of it all nothing would ever be the same for any of the surviving students or their teachers.
1. Chapter 1

******Warnings:**

******For the whole story: **This story is labeled M for a reason, this is a story about a school shooting and it's not the kind that Glee had (as far as I know, since I haven't seen that episode, only heard about it) There will be deaths in this story and the survivors will suffer from physical and psychological damages - You have been warned!

******For chapter 1: **Bullying, School shooting, Cursing and Violence.

******Disclaimer: **I don't own Glee. I have no medical training, so I'm not guaranteeing that anything of what I'm writing is correct.

This story is unbeta'd and my first language isn't English.

**A/N: **I probably don't have to point it out, but this clearly isn't a fluffy story. This story is posted for the Pezberry Week 2014 Day 7: Free day on Tumblr. Feel free to tell me what you think about the story.

**NB! **For the most parts everything that has happened up until season three have also happened in this story (There are some exceptions, but that will be cleared up along the way) but everything after the last episode in season two is most likely AU. This story starts not long after the new school year in season three started.

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**Chapter 1**

Santana was just going to touch up her makeup before class started, what she didn't expect was to stumble upon a newly slushied Rachel Berry, dripping blueberry flavored ice all over the bathroom floor.

"Aww that color suits you perfectly Midget. Maybe now your long-lost relatives can finally recognize you, so they can come and drag you back to the Smurf village were you belong." Santana smirked in triumph. She was about to check her makeup and leave when Rachel, to Santana's big surprise, talked back.

"Why do you always have to be so mean Santana? Can't you just for once in your life behave like a descent human being and stop being such a bitch to everyone!" Rachel was trembling in anger, but the moment she ended her speech, she suddenly realized what and to whom she had spoken. She quickly slapped a hand over her mouth, but the damage was already done.

Santana had at first been stunned by the fact that Berry had been brave enough to talk back to her, but then she got really irritated that someone had dared to break the golden rule of William McKinley high school, which clearly stated that no student was allowed to talk back to one of their superiors without permission.

"How dare you talk to me like that Dwarf! Don't you know who I am and what I can do to you? I'm like royalty in this school, what I say is law around here! If you think that I'm a bitch to you now, then you really don't know me at all. I could make the rest of your pathetic school life here a living hell, if I wanted to. You think being slushied once a day is bad? How about I get you slushied before every class?! On top of that I might just for the fun of it steal that overgrown orc, that you so pathetically choose to call your boyfriend, away from you. Everyone knows that he wouldn't say no to this." Santana motioned up and down her own body. She was about to continue, but abruptly stopped when Rachel suddenly started crying. Surprisingly enough Santana had never seen Berry cry before, so it really threw her off her game.

Santana started cursing under her breath as she silently continued watching tear after tear spill down Berry's cheeks. She hated when people cried, especially if it was a girl. If it was a boy she could usually just laugh at him for being such a pussy, but this was somehow different. She had no idea what to do with this situation, which was starting to feel really unconformable. She had almost decided that the best thing was just to ignore it and leave the crying hobbit in the bathroom by herself, but then Rachel suddenly sobbed out "Fi – Finn left meeee! He – He thought it was best for his reputation to get back together with Quinnnnn!"

Oh fuck me! It was that stupid asshole again. Why couldn't he just make up his mind and choose once and for all which girl he really wanted. Fabray – Berry, Berry – Fabray. How hard could it be to stick to one?! Santana really didn't look forward to the moment when that jerk once again decided to break up with Quinn to go back to Berry. The last time he had done that, Santana had ended up being forced to comfort Tubbers for a whole week and she truly despised all that mushy crap! Which was the reason why she suddenly wanted to march straight out of that bathroom to kill that Pillsbury Dough Turd for being a complete idiot. He clearly had to be brain-dead for dumping Berry in favor of The Ice Queen! However when Rachel started crying even harder, Santana unexpected felt a pang of sympathy for the other girl. She could still clearly remembered how hard it had been for her when Brittany had rejected her for that Four-Eyed Loser. So before Santana could think about what she was doing, she quickly stepped forward and hugged Rachel to comfort her.

The fact that Santana was suddenly hugging her, took Rachel by surprise, but most of all it almost scared her to death. I mean come on! It was after all the most popular girl in William McKinley High School - Santana Lopez, hugging the school's biggest loser – Rachel Berry. So it was no wonder that Rachel, at first, was stiff as a statue, but when she finally registered that Santana wasn't actually trying to kill her, she even surprised herself by melting into Santana's warm embrace. Without either of the girls knowing it, they were both silently thinking how good and right the hug felt and surprisingly neither of them wanted to let go of the other one.

The first thing Santana noticed when she embraced Rachel was how wonderful the other girls hair smelled and to Santana's horror she felt that the smell was slowly starting to turn her on. Of course she immediately tried to brush it off, blaming it on something else than her being so close to the freak. The fact was that she had been turned on by nearly everything lately, even something so mundane as a bush could do that to her now, so it wouldn't be such a big surprise if it turned out that even trolls could do that too. Santana also knew that the only reason as to why her buttons could be so easily turned on by everything, unfortunately now including dwarfs, was sadly because she hadn't had sex with anyone in a very long time. The last time she had been intimate with someone had been with Brittany, before her best friend had unexpectedly decided to dumped her for McCripple Pants. Sure she had been "dating" Sam and Karofsky, but Sam had been a proper gentleman and never pushed her for sex, which was probably only because he was still in love with Quinn. David had obviously been gay, so he really didn't want what she had to offer under her Cheerios uniform, which Santana had obviously been grateful for. Surprisingly she hadn't even ended up having sex with Brittany again, after she had finally broke up with that stupid boy. Santana had obviously thought that Brittany would have given her a second chance after the break up, but instead her supposedly best friend hadn't even looked her way. Instead of giving her a second thought Brittany had immediately started dating some dumb jock, who turned out to be so stupid that he couldn't even spell his own name correctly. Which had been the main reason why Santana had ended up spending the whole summer with Quinn, while the love of her life was all over her new boyfriend. So Santana honestly felt for what Rachel was going through, because she knew for a fact how devastating it felt to have someone rip your heart out, before they decided to jump up and down on it just for fun. At least that was how she had felt when Brittany first rejected her for Artie and then on top of that had chosen to start dating that other jerk, instead of coming back to her best friend who had laid her heart on the line and bravely confessed that she loved her more than anyone else in the world.

So as Santana was holding Rachel in her arms, she silently decided that maybe she could try to help the other girl deal with her heartache, but of course only as long as no one else knew about it. If anyone saw her being friendly with Berry, chaos would be ensured. The whole school would probably think that she had gone soft and then her position as head bitch would be up for grabs. Which obviously wasn't an option in Santana's book. It was that frightening thought that finally got Santana to realize the possibility that at any moment someone could walk into the bathroom to witness her hugging Berry. Which was obviously a really good reason why it was important for Santana to end the hug as quickly as possible, even if she didn't want to. However Santana couldn't forget that she had a reputation to uphold.

In an attempt to get Rachel's attention, Santana decided to clear her throat. Luckily it seemed to pull Rachel out of her own dream state and they both reluctantly let go of each other. After the hug was finally disentangled, they were both shyly trying to avoid eye contact. So they ended up looking down at the floor instead, both a little embarrassed at how long they had ended up hugging each other. Santana was the first one to look up and break the silence.

"He really didn't deserve you Rachel. You are going to be so much better off without him. Finn never appreciated you for the wonderful girl that you are. You deserve so much better." Santana really didn't know where that came from and she almost freaked out when Rachel started to cry again. She desperately tried to stop her, before it got out of hand again, because the school bell was soon going to ring, which meant that the two of them had to leave for class.

"Please don't cry!"

Rachel smiled, despite the tears, at Santana and quickly dried them away. She was about to say something back to her, when she suddenly got interrupted by a blood freezing scream from the hallway outside the bathroom. Just a second later an ear splintering shooting started up, which was quickly followed by even more people screaming and the sound of students running for their lives past the bathroom door. The sound made both girls freeze, before they quickly looked at each other with fear in their eyes, but before they could do anything the bathroom door was kicked in and a boy came barging in with a handgun. Santana didn't recognize him, but out of her natural protective instinct she immediately steered Rachel safely behind herself. When the guy noticed that Santana was in the room, he started laughing maliciously.

"Just the bitch I was looking for!" Rachel, who hadn't gotten the time to look at the boy before Santana shielded her, recognized his voice when he spoke. She peeked out from behind Santana.

"Steve?"

"Rachel!" The boy obviously knew her and smiled, but his smile quickly dropped when he saw Rachel's tear-stained face. He pointed his gun at Santana.

"Was she bothering you?" His voice was suddenly soft, as he was directing his whole focus onto Rachel.

"No! No she wasn't!" Rachel urgently shook her head and looked at Santana, who was suddenly looking extremely pale.

"Okay, that's good." Steve fondly smiled at her, but then he got a more serious expression on his face.

"Now Rachel if you could be so kind as to step away from the devil herself, so I can do what I came here to do, I would really appreciate that." Rachel didn't move.

"Wh - what are you going to do?" Her voice was trembling with fear, because she was almost a hundred percent certain that she already knew the answer. She could still hear screaming and shooting coming from outside the bathroom door, so it didn't take a genius to figure out why Steve was asking her to move away from Santana. Not to mention that the gun in his hand and the attack rifle strapped to his back, left little to the imagination.

"Well that's really none of your business-" Steve looked a little bit angry because of the delay, but then he smiled at her."-but since I like you, I'll let you in on a secret." He pointed his gun in the direction of the hallway.

"Me and my two buddies have finally had enough of how the jocks and the Cheerios are treating us, so we decided that it was high time that someone paid them back for what they have done to us. You of all people in this school should know how evil they are. I mean you're the only one in this hell hole, who's been bullied more than my friends and I. You know that they're all a bunch of soulless monsters, who's only goal is to humiliate you so they can feel better about themselves." He looked at Santana with so much hatred, that Santana quickly took a step back in fear and bumped into Rachel. Steve turned his attention back to Rachel and his whole facial expression immediately softened. He gave her another smile, but this time it looked to be more impatient than genuine.

"So Rachel I'll ask you one more time, but only because I really like you, since you were the only one in this stinking school that even bothered to say hello to me. Could you please step away from Satan, so I can send her back to Hell?" Rachel could feel how Santana had started shaking beside her. When she discreetly tried to look at her, Rachel saw that tears were silently running down Santana's cheeks. It didn't take long for Rachel to make up her mind, instead of stepping to the side to expose Santana, she quickly moved her own body even more in front of the other girl. Then she looked straight at Steve, who could see that she had a determent look in her eyes.

"No. I'm sorry Steve, but I can't do what you're asking me to do. I can't let you kill Santana!" Steve looked surprised by the firmness in Rachel's voice, but his facial expression morphed into one of pure rage the second he finally understood that Rachel was refusing to budge.

"No, NO! Rachel! If you don't move right now, I'll have to shoot you! MOVE!" Rachel didn't flinch, with her action she gave Steve no indication that she was ever going to comply to his request.

Steve lowered his gun and laughed hollowly. "Suit yourself. If you're willing to die for that bitch, who has done nothing more than tormented you for most of your life, then so be it." He raised his gun back up and pointed it directly at Rachel. The moment the safety clicked back, it seemed to wake up something in Santana. She quickly threw herself in front of Rachel, at the same time as Steve pulled the trigger. A split second later she felt the bullet rip into her flesh. Santana immediately fell down to the bathroom floor, because of the overwhelming pain and screamed in agony.

Steve was completely taken by surprise by Santana's unexpected action, but he quickly started laughing in delight when he saw that he had ended up shooting her instead of Rachel. "Well looks like this is your luck day Rachel. You're obviously not going to die today, so you really should thank your lucky star." He looked down at Santana laying on the floor in pain and gave her an evil smirk.

"As for you bitch! I could probably shoot you in the head and end your suffering, but that would be too good for you. You deserve to suffer! So I'm going to let you lay here and bleed out, till you die of blood loss instead. That'll be a long and painful death, just like you deserve!" He threw his head back and laughed dramatically "Mwahahaha!" Before he started kicking Santana.

"Do you like my evil laugh, bitch?" He laughed again, when Santana screamed in pain because of the kick.

"I have been practicing for months. I hope my laughter is the last thing you'll remember before you die!" He kicked Santana one last time, before he finally walked towards the door. He was about to exit the bathroom, but suddenly hesitated. He quickly turned around to look at Rachel again.

"You really disappointed me today Rachel. Standing up for that bitch!" He pointed at Santana and shook his head in disbelief.

"You're only alive because I like you. You obviously don't deserve to live when you chose to help monsters like her, but thankfully I'm such a good guy, so I'm going to save you." He smiled at a still frozen Rachel.

"But just for the record if you really want to live, you better stay in this room. I might like you, but my friend Eric won't be as nice as me. You see, he has a little problem with people that's not from America." He motioned in her direction.

"You know like you're a Jew, so you're from Israel and that's not America. So if Eric sees you, he will kill you." He smiled.

"I just thought that I should warn you." He suddenly grinned at her.

"But always remember that you're only alive because of me! I let you live! So I think that when you win all those awards you been talking about winning, you should thank me for helping you achieve them." He winked at Rachel. Then he turned around and laughed his evil laughter one last time, before shouted over his shoulder on the way out "Bye bitch! I hope you choke on your own blood!" When he opened the bathroom door, they could suddenly hear all the screaming and shooting outside much clearer, but then the door slammed shut behind him and most of the noises outside faded away.

Santana was still laying on the floor with her head down and by the look of it she was in immense pain. Rachel, who had been frozen since the moment Santana had thrown herself in front of her, finally woke up when Santana cried out in anguish. She immediately crouched down beside the wounded girl and tried to carefully turn her around, but she quickly stopped when Santana started struggling against her grip and screamed out because of the blinding pain coursing through her whole body because of the sudden movement.

"Santana please! I need to turn you around, so I can stop the bleeding." Rachel could already see that the floor under Santana was slowly turning red.

Rachel could barely hear what Santana was trying to pant out, between her whimpers of pain. "Maybe.. Maybe.. You.. should.. let me.. die. I obviously.. don't deserve.. to live." Rachel was truly shocked by what she heard, but when Santana cried out again, she got a determent look in her eyes.

"We haven't got the time right now to discuss everything that is wrong with that statement Santana, but rest assured we're going to have that discussion later on, when we're both safe and still alive. Now I'm going to turn you around and you're going to let me, because you're Santana Lopez and you're one of the strongest girls I know. You can do this Santana! So please stop fighting me and let me help you. Please!" Apparently that helped, because Santana stopped struggling and Rachel carefully turned her around.

Santana's Cheerios uniform was already soaked in her own blood and Rachel knew that she had to take it off, to get to the bullet's entry wound, so she was going to be able to stop the bleeding. However getting Santana's cheer top off, turned out to be nearly impossible, since the top was so tight. Even if Rachel tried as carefully as she could to get it off, it still ended up causing Santana even more pain. Rachel was internally freaking out, because of the amount of blood that was steadily gushing out of the wound. So she quickly decided to give up on it and instead she desperately tried to press her hands against the wound on the outside of Santana's clothes to stop the blood from pouring out, but it didn't help. Rachel was almost on the brink of panicking, when she suddenly remembered that her roller bag was still standing beside the sink and she hurried to get it.

To Rachel's delight she quickly found the pair of scissors she always had in there, in case of a paper emergency and started to cut the Cheerios top off Santana's body. When she was finally able to lift up the ruined top, she could see that Santana had been shot in her abdomen. She silently wondered how it was possible that so much blood could come out of such a tiny little hole. Rachel carefully checked Santana's backside to see if there was an exit wound, which there wasn't. That meant that the bullet was still inside Santana and Rachel knew that she needed surgery as fast as possible. However that wasn't an option right now, since Rachel could still hear some faint shooting coming from somewhere inside the school. She obviously needed to get some help, but she knew that she couldn't leave Santana behind, at least not as long as she was still bleeding. So instead she tried to do the best she could, desperately trying to remember that one first aid class she had attended, when her daddy had mistakenly picked the wrong room at one of their weekly family outings. The only rule her fathers had, at these famous Berry outings, was to always try new things. That day they were going to try pottery painting, but instead they had ended up learning first aid. However that had been a long time ago, so Rachel really hoped she was doing something right.

The first thing she clearly remembered was that it was important to put pressure on the wound. She knew that the instructor had used something to stop the bleeding, most likely it had been a cloth compression. So Rachel quickly looked around for something to stop the bleeding with, but there wasn't anything inside the bathroom she could use. Her own clothes were covered in slushy, so they weren't clean enough to cover Santana's wound. She desperately wished that she had managed to grab her slushy kit before she ran into the bathroom, but unfortunately it hadn't been time for that since she had been so unlucky to get some of that awful liquid in her eyes. Everyone that had ever been slushied knew that if you got some of it in your eyes, you needed to rinse them out as fast as possible or else it would only get worse. Which had been the reason why she hadn't had the time to get her kit, a fact that was really irritating her now, but luckily Rachel suddenly remembered that she had a jumper underneath her animal sweater. She was praying that the slushy hadn't managed to seep through, so hopefully it was still clean. She quickly peeled off her top and to her relief she found that the backside of her jumper was still untouched. So she hurriedly took the good side and placed it over Santana's entry wound and applied pressure with the heel of her hand to get the wound to stop bleeding.

"Santana I think that you have to raise your knees up. I believe that's the right thing to do when someone have been shot in their abdomen." A clearly sluggish Santana listen to her and slowly lifted her knees up. She was trembling a little and Rachel looked at her with concern. "How do you feel?" Santana had her eyes closed.

"Like I have been shot!" Rachel didn't know if she wanted to laugh or cry in relief that she was still lucid. Santana opened her eyes and looked up at her, then she looked down to Rachel almost naked upper body.

"Whoo-hoo Berry! You didn't have to take your clothes off for me. If you hadn't noticed it when I saved your life, I kinda like you already, so you don't have to seduce me." Santana smirked at Rachel, who quietly laughed back, but abruptly stopped when Santana started coughing up blood. That freaked Rachel out, but she tried not to alarm Santana. She still kept the pressure directly on the wound, but she was at the same time searching for something. Santana had closed her eyes again, which Rachel was grateful for since it meant that she could take a closer look at her.

Santana looked pale, her skin was clammy and her breathing was rapid. When Rachel finally looked down to where she was applying pressure, she saw that a large bruise was starting to form around Santana's abdomen. The sight frightened her. This was not good, not good at all. If she remembered correctly those were some of the signs that Santana might have internal bleeding, which was extremely bad. It meant that Santana needed medical attention as fast as possible. Rachel was starting to panic. Santana desperately needed help or else she would soon be dead, but there was still no way that she could leave Santana alone to get help. She was frantically trying to find a solution.

After two more minutes, Rachel knew that she must have been applying pressure to the wound for at least ten minuets. When she carefully checked the wound, she could see that it had stopped bleeding. That meant that she could try to get help, but what if it started to bleed again and she wasn't there to stop it? Santana would probably die because of the blood loss, long before Rachel could get back to her, but Santana obviously needed surgical help before it was too late.

Rachel desperately wished she had her cellphone with her, but she always left it in her locker after her fathers had refused to buy her a new one, when her previous two had mysteriously went missing. They had both ended up been ruined by slushies at school, but since Rachel hadn't wanted to tell them about the constant bullying, that she went through everyday, they had blamed her for losing them. It had taken a good chunk of her own savings to buy herself a new one, so she was extra careful with this one in hopes that she wouldn't lose it in yet another slushy attack. Rachel obviously didn't want to go out in the hallway to get her phone, but when Santana started mumbling something about her wanting to see the duckies again with Brittany, Rachel quickly decided that she had to risk her own life to save Santana's. That was the least she could do after Santana had saved hers. She was about to tell Santana that she had to try to lay as still as possible till she came back, when there suddenly was a loud bang from outside in the hallway. It almost sounded like an explosion. It was rapidly followed by a lot of running and shouting outside. It felt like utter chaos had broken loose when shooting suddenly started everywhere.

Rachel was petrified that Steve or one of his friends would come into the bathroom again, but then the shooting abruptly stopped and everything went dead silent. Rachel didn't know what to do, but when she heard someone talking quietly into a walkie-talkie, just outside the bathroom door, she didn't think about what she was doing. She just ran to the door and opened it to get help for Santana. When the door swung open, Rachel was suddenly faced with several men dressed in black from top to bottom, who immediately pointed all their attack rifles straight at her. Rachel automatically raised her hands over her head, because of the sight in front of her. In the back of her mind she thought that she probably looked pretty strange standing there in her blood covered bra, but that clearly wasn't important right now, Santana was.

"I - I need help, my friend needs help. She's been shot and I think that she might have internal bleeding!" She rushed out. The man who looked to be the SWAT leader, silently signaled for two of his guys to go inside the bathroom to check out the wounded. When they had secured the room, one of them knelt down to take a look at Santana.

"Hey Cap, she need immediate medical attention, she's not looking good." The guy with the walkie-talkie immediately signaled out, but the message he got back was that they still weren't willing to send in the emergency medical team, at least not before they knew for sure that the school was secure. That made Rachel panic, Santana needed help now. She quickly turned to the man she believed was in charge.

"We need to get her out now! She needs an operation. Please, I don't want her to die!" She was pleading with him to understand and she started to cry when he silently shook his head.

"I'm sorry, but they won't do anything until the school has been secured. Right now we don't know how many perpetrators there still are left inside this school, we can't endanger any medical personal before we have immobilized them all." That gave Rachel some hope back.

"How many have you taken down?" He furrowed his brows in confusion, because of the strange question.

"I can't tell you that." His refusal made Rachel angry, she didn't have the time to play games, so she shouted out "How many?!" The guy looked around frightened by her outburst and signaled for her to be quiet and hissed out "Three! Our teams have managed to take down three. Don't you dare raise your voice again, there could be more of them around." Rachel couldn't care less that he was threatening her, this was good news to her.

"If you have taken down three boys, then there aren't more left." She looked him straight in the eyes. He looked a little puzzled by her statement.

"And how do you know that for sure?"

Rachel then hurried to tell him a shorter version of what had happened to her and Santana. He then signaled for the guy with the walkie-talkie to pass on the story to their supervisor. To Rachel's dismay they still hesitated about sending someone in, claiming that the information wasn't from a reliable source. Rachel was about to protest, but then suddenly one of the guys tending to Santana shouted out "Cap she's going into shock!" That finally made the leader take action and he quickly demand that a medical team was sent in, he even guaranteed to his supervisor that he would take the full responsibility for their safety. Luckily it didn't take long for the team to arrive, but to Rachel it felt like it had been hours. Tears were silently streaming down her cheeks as she witnessed the medical team finally arriving. They quickly proceeded to intubate Santana, so she could breathe easier with their help, before they put her on a gurney and brought her out to a waiting ambulance, which immediately took her to the nearest hospital.

Rachel desperately wanted to stay by Santana's side, but she got held back by the SWAT leader. He signaled for one of his guys to take her to their supervisors, so they could debrief her about her knowledge about the perpetrators. So instead of following Santana, Rachel ended up being quickly escorted out off the school, where she was thankfully given a blanket to wrap around her half-naked upper body, before she was interrogate by several people regarding her knowledge about the perpetrators. After they were finally satisfied with her answers, she was released into the care of her worried fathers.


	2. Chapter 2

******Disclaimer: **I don't own Glee or RhinoChill. I have no medical training, so I'm not guaranteeing that anything of what I'm writing is correct.

This story is unbeta'd and my first language isn't English.

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**Chapter 2**

Rachel felt like her fathers were trying to suffocate her with their combined hugs, after they were finally reunited. It was clear to her that her daddy had been crying, but it looked like her dad had managed to stay strong for his husband's sake, but both of them started crying the second they had their daughter safely back in their arms again. It took a long time before either of them were willing to let go of her again. After they finally loosened the hug, so she could breathe normally again, Hiram made sure that Rachel was free to go before they both grabbed a hold of their daughter and hurried to their waiting car.

* * *

LeRoy had started the drive back home, when Rachel finally spoke up "Where are we going?" Both of her parents looked back at her with concern clearly shinning in their eyes.

"Home Baby Girl." Hiram told her and smiled.

"I'm not going home! I have to go to the hospital." Rachel was determined. She needed to know if Santana was okay.

"Why? Are you hurt?!" LeRoy hurriedly whipped his head around to look at her, fear written all over his face, but Hiram quickly made sure to get him to concentrate on the road again, because the last thing they needed right now was to end up in a car crash.

"No, but I have to know that Santana is okay." Hiram looked at her questioningly.

"Who's Santana? Can't you go see her tomorrow?"

"No, I can't wait! She saved my life. She took a bullet that was meant for me! I need to know if she's alive!" Both her parents exchanged worried looks, they hadn't known that their daughter had been so close to the shooter.

"But Baby Girl, there's nothing you can do. How about we phone the hospital when we get home and ask how she's doing? Right now I think you need some rest and something to eat."

The longer they talked, the farther away from the hospital they got. Rachel couldn't take more of her fathers staling. She needed to see Santana right now! So she threw one of her famous temper tantrum to get them to turn around, but when that didn't work Rachel quickly changed tactics. She looked at her fathers and said with an eerily calm tone "If you don't turn this car around right now, I'll hate you both for the rest of my life." Hiram and LeRoy looked at their daughter in shock and all LeRoy could managed to say was "Wow!" Their daughter had from a young age always had a lot of temper tantrums, when she didn't get her way, so they were both used to them by now. However Rachel had never told any of her parents that she hated them, so the two men quietly looked at each other in concern.

Hiram didn't know what to do, this was clearly not an acceptable behavior coming from Rachel, but he obviously couldn't reprimand her for it. Their little star had already been through so much today. She had after all been held captive and by the sound of it her life had even been threatened at point-blank by a lunatic. The last thing she probably needed now was for her fathers to start yelling at her for not behaving properly.

"I'm not kidding! If you don't stop this car right now, I'll open this door and jump out, even if you're still driving. Turn around, Now!" Rachel had started to cry angry tears out of pure frustration. She knew, in the back of her mind, that she was acting like a little brat, but she had to see Santana! She had to know that she was still alive. Apparently her fathers had finally decided to listen to her, because LeRoy silently turned the car around. Hiram looked back at her.

"We know that you have been through a lot today and we're truly grateful that you didn't get hurt. So this time we are going to excuse your behavior Young Lady, but that doesn't mean that we aren't going to talk about this later." Rachel knew that she was in trouble. He dad only called her by that nickname when he was disappointed in her because of something she had done, but right now she couldn't care less. She had to see Santana! She actually felt like she couldn't breath, before she knew for certain that the other girl was still alive.

* * *

When they finally reached Lima Memorial, Rachel jumped out off the car before her daddy even had the time to park it properly. She ran as fast as she could to the Emergency Center, where the receptionist told her that Santana had been taken to their Trauma Center, since she had been an acute patient. Rachel immediately demanded to get to know how she was doing and if she was still in surgery. Instead of a simple answer, she got fed that stupid line about not being part of Santana's family. They clearly couldn't give away sensitive information like that about a patient to people outside of the Lopez family. Rachel was pretty sure she would have attacked that infuriating women, if it hadn't been for her dad taking a hold of her. He and LeRoy had finally managed to park the car and catch up to her. By the sight of it, they had barely gotten there in time to stop their precious baby from ending up in jail for manslaughter. Hiram was starting to get really concerned about the way their daughter was suddenly acting, she had never behaved like this before.

"Baby Girl you heard the nice lady, she can't give you that information. Like she said Santana has been taken to the ER, where she's clearly in good hands. There's nothing we can do but wait. So how about we go home and try again tomorrow?" He asked hopefully. As one of Rachel's dads he probably should have known that it wouldn't be that easy.

Rachel didn't want to go home, she wanted to see Santana, she needed to see her! She didn't care if she was being rude or loud and she certainly didn't care that she was inside of a hospital.

"I NEED TO KNOW HOW SANTANA IS DOING!" Rachel was struggling hard to get out of her dads grip. By the look of it she wanted to strangle the woman in front of her, that was so blatantly refusing her access to Santana.

The receptionist was probably about to call the hospital security, when someone suddenly asked "What is going on? Why is this young woman shouting so loud and demanding to see Santana?" The receptionist looked up at the man talking.

"Oh, Dr. Lopez! I'm so sorry! I tried to tell her that I couldn't give out Santana's information, since she's obviously not a family member, but she blatantly refused to comply. I was just calling for security to remove her from the premises."

Rachel turned to look at the man, who had spoken. She noticed that there was a woman standing by his side, who was furiously whipping her eyes and sniffling into her handkerchief. Then it hit her: Dr. Lopez! Hadn't Santana always been bragging about her father being a doctor? Maybe this was her dad? But before she could say anything, Dr. Lopez suddenly looked at her.

"Why are you so interested in my daughter? As far as I know you're not one of her closest friends, because I've met them all. So who are you Ms-?"

"Berry, Rachel Barbra Berry and I-" She got cut off by the sniffling woman, who had immediately stopped drying her eyes when she heard the name. She was looking at Rachel with big surprised eyes.

"You're Rachel Berry! The Berry that goes to the same school as my little girl?"

"Y - Yes-" Rachel didn't know what was going on. In the corner of her eyes she could faintly see that the hospital security was rapidly approaching them. Before she could say or do anything more, the woman had stepped forward and was now giving her a bone crunching hug.

"You saved my precious baby! I don't know how I can ever repay you!" She was now crying hysterically and kissing Rachel repeatedly on her cheeks. Rachel had no idea how this woman already knew that it had been her that had kept Santana alive. All the attention she was suddenly getting was a little bit overwhelming. Luckily she was saved from being hugged and kissed to death, when Mr. Lopez gently pulled what Rachel now guessed was Santana's mom away from her.

"Now, now I think that's enough dear. We don't want to scare the little girl too much." Then he turned around to one of the security guards.

"Thank you for coming Jack, but I can take it from here. It was just a misunderstanding. We have solved the problem." The security guard nodded.

"No problem Dr. Lopez." Then he signaled to his partner and they both turned around to leave. Dr. Lopez, who was still holding his crying wife, looked at Rachel and her fathers.

"How about you all come with me and my wife to my office, where we can talk in private?" Rachel looked up at her fathers with pleading eyes, they silently nodded in agreement.

* * *

After a relatively short walk, they were all seated in Dr. Lopez enormous office. He was sitting in a designer sofa with his wife, who was again sniffling and drying her eyes.

"So young lady we heard from one the paramedics that brought Santana to the ER, that we should really thank one girl named Rachel Berry for saving our daughter's life. He told us that if you hadn't taken care of her after she got shot and demanded that the rescue team had to send her to the hospital, our daughter would have died before they could have made it to the hospital in time for us to save her. Like my wife said, we don't know how to thank you for helping her." He looked at Rachel with eyes shinning with tears. Rachel felt a little unconformable and squirmed in her chair.

"You don't have to thank me. Really. I just need to know how Santana is doing." Dr. Lopez looked at his wife and then at Rachel.

"Well, right now she's in surgery to remove the bullet in her abdomen. My wife and I were on our way to my office to wait for the operation to be completed, when we heard you shouting Santana's name. We could have stayed in the emergency waiting room, but since the doctor who is operating on my daughter is one of my closest friends, he told us to go wait in my office. He's going to call us when the operation is over. We just have to wait and pray that everything goes well." Then he directed all his attention at Rachel.

"In the meantime I would really like to know what exactly happened at your school today. We only know that our daughter got shot and that you kept her alive. So if you wouldn't mind Rachel, I would be really grateful if you could tell me what you know." At this point every adult in the room were looking at Rachel with curious eyes, because they all wanted to know the truth about what had happened to their daughters.

Rachel sighed, she really didn't want to tell the story again, but it looked like she had no choice. So for the third time that day, she ended up telling the story about what had transpired at their school earlier that day. She might have skipped the part about being slushied and Santana being a bully, but everything else she told them was true. When she finished her story, all the parents in the room were crying and Mrs. Lopez kept muttering "My poor baby. My poor, poor baby." over and over again.

Dr. Lopez was still looking at Rachel, while he calmly comforted his distressed wife. He had this strange look in his eyes. It was the same look he had given her, when she told them that Santana had jumped in front of her and taken the bullet that Steve had meant for her. Rachel didn't know what that look meant, but it made her want to run away and hide. Dr. Lopez was about to say something, but was abruptly stopped by a man suddenly rushing into his office without knocking. Mrs. Lopez looked up and Rachel could see that her skin instantly paled, which really scared Rachel.

"I'm so sorry for barging in like this Frederico, but I need to talk to you, now!" Then he looked at Mrs. Lopez.

"There's no need to panic Maribel, Santana is still alive, but I need to discuss something with your husband. We need to make a decision about what to do next and it's really important that we make it quickly. Since Frederico is a doctor he can make this decision about your daughter quicker, I hope that's okay with you Maribel. You know that I only want the best for my god-daughter." Mrs. Lopez nodded and motioned for her husband to go. They were all waiting anxiously for him to return.

* * *

Everyone inside Dr. Lopez's office jumped in their chairs in surprise, when Santana's father came back into the room. He looked worriedly at his wife.

"Honey I have to tell you something." Maribel looked like she was about to faint. So he quickly sat by her side again and grabbed her hands to comfort her.

"Santana is still alive, but there was some complications with the surgery." Then he looked at the Berry men.

"If you don't want your daughter to hear this, I would recommend you take her out now." Hiram looked at his husband and nodded. Rachel was about to protest, because they had obviously decided that it was best for them to leave, but she immediately shut her mouth when her dad started speaking.

"I think we'll stay. Rachel won't let us leave, at least not before she knows that Santana's alright anyway. I highly doubt that she would leave this room willingly, not without a lot of kicking and screaming. So the wisest thing to do is probably to stay." Then he took a scowling Rachel into his arms to hold her for support. It didn't take long before Rachel welcomed her fathers warm embrace. Everything didn't feel quite as hopeless when she was enveloped by his secure arms. Frederico nodded and turned back to his wife.

"Our baby is still alive Maribel, but because of some complications that occurred under her surgery, they asked me to make a quick decision about what they should do next. What Patrick came to tell me was that he got the bullet removed, but unfortunately Santana suffered a cardiac arrest. They had to use a defibrillator to get her heart started again and they thankfully succeeded in bringing her back to life. However because of the lack of oxygen, that the cardiac arrest resulted in, she has gone into a coma. She's not responding to any stimuli, light or sound. So before Patrick came up to see me, he sent her to a CT scan to check for abnormal brain activity, that could confirm that she's in a coma. When the two of us were talking, he got a call telling him that the scan had confirmed his suspicion. So Patrick wanted me to make a quick decision as to which treatment they should use on her. As you know Patrick and I have been running a clinical research trial, where we use induced hypothermia on cardiac arrest survivors. Some of our trial patients were like Santana, they were also comatosed after their cardiac arrest. In our findings we have seen that if we treat patients like Santana with induced hypothermia, they will have a greater change at surviving and waking up than if they're treated with the hospitals standard care. Since Santana meets all of our requirements to participate in the clinical research trial, Patrick came here to ask me if I wanted to let her be treated with the induced hypothermia. I told him to do it. You know that I really believe in this research and I would trust Patrick with my own life. Santana is his god-daughter, so he will do everything he can to save her, you know that." Maribel looked up at her husband, with tears streaming down her cheeks.

"I trust your judgment Frederico. You know what's best for our baby. I know that you made the right decision. Now all we can do is pray for her to to come back to us." Mr. Lopez hugged his crying wife and lovingly kissed her temple.

"I love you so much and all I want is for our baby to wake up."

The Berry family looked at the grieving parents in front of them, with tears in their eyes. They could only imagine how they would have felt if it had been Rachel instead of Santana. Rachel however just wanted to see Santana again, but she also needed to know what that treatment Dr. Lopez was talking about entailed. She didn't want to disturb them, but she clearly couldn't wait any longer.

"Dr. Lopez, I'm sorry to disturb you, but I really want to know what induced hypothermia is?" Mrs. Lopez dried her tears and looked at her husband.

"Frederico, I think you should tell Rachel what Santana has to go through. I think she deserves to know after saving our baby." She turned and smiled at Rachel. That made Rachel feel uncomfortable again, she really didn't like that they kept saying that she saved Santana's life.

Dr. Lopez looked at his wife and nodded. He kissed her, before he walked behind his office desk, where he rolled down an illustration of a human body. Then he looked at the Berry family.

"As you probably understood my good friend Dr. Reed and I are both working for the heart and vascular Institute here at Lima Memorial. This institute is known for using the latest procedures in cardiovascular science, which often means that we also have a lot of clinical research trials related to these procedures. One of these trials is being supervised be Dr. Reed and I. The trial we are working on involves the use of induced hypothermia on patient that has survived a cardiac arrest. As you probably know humans can get hypothermia, when they get so cold that their body temperature drops below 35 degrees Celsius (95 °F) . So what we do in our research trial is to lower the cardiac arrest patients body temperature to 32 – 34 degrees Celsius (89,6 – 93,2 °F). What we so far have found out is that the death rates are a little bit lower in the test group. We have also experienced that the outcomes for this group are better, than for other patients that get standard treatment for their cardiac arrest." Rachel raised her hand. Dr. Lopez gave her a half-smile. "Yes ms. Berry?"

"How do you get Santana's body temperature so low?" Dr. Lopez nodded.

"That's a good question. There are many ways to artificially lower a humans body temperature. We choose a method that is called RhinoChill®. What that entails is the fact that we cool the body down through the patients nose." He pointed at the illustration of the human body.

"We insert two small tubes up the nasal cavity, in which we use to spray a coolant mist in to the body. The mist cools the brain, which in turn also cools the blood in the brain. The cooled blood will then circulate throughout the rest of the body and cool down the patient till the right temperature." He was illustrating the whole procedure by pointing out where all the different processes would occur on the human body. Rachel lifted her hand again. This time Dr. Lopez couldn't contain his smile, he was really starting to like this young woman. He silently nodded for her to ask her question.

"How long does Santana have to be cooled down for, before she can wake up?" Dr. Lopez smile quickly faded and suddenly he looked a lot more serious.

"When Dr. Reed starts the procedure, Santana has to be in the induced hypothermia for 24 hours. After that is when the critical part starts, because that's when we have to warm her up again. You have to understand that if you suffer hypothermia you can't just warm the patient up too quickly, if you do that they will die. Therefore we have to slowly rewarm the patient and that procedure have to be carefully monitored for another 24 hours. So we will not know for sure if Santana will survive, or wake up from her coma, for at least 48 hours. The only thing we can do is hope and pray for the procedure to work and for her to wake up." He looked at Rachel to see if she had more questions, but she was lost in her own thoughts.

* * *

48 hours! She had to wait at least 48 hours to see Santana again and that was only if she survived the procedures she had to go through. Rachel felt like she couldn't breath and she looked up at Dr. Lopez with tears suddenly streaming down her cheeks.

"I just want to see her!" Frederico looked at Rachel. This girl was breaking his heart. It also surprised him to see how much she really seemed to care for his daughter, even though he already knew that she wasn't even one of Santana's closest friends. He smiled at her.

"I think that could be arranged." Rachel immediate light up, it actually looked like someone had told her that she was finally going to meet Barbara Streisand.

"Really!" Frederico's smiled broadened even more by her enthusiasm, but he quickly got serious again.

"You can't come into the room where they are performing the procedure, but the room where we do the clinical research trials has a spectator balcony with a window that the residents, doctors or possible investors can oversee the trials if they want too. I think it will be okay for you to come with me to look at Santana. If you want to?"

"I would love to do that!" Rachel felt a lot lighter. She was going to get to see Santana again, which had been the only thing she really wanted to do since the ambulance drove her away. Dr. Lopez looked at her parents.

"Is this okay with you guys?" LeRoy looked at Hiram and when he nodded, he turned back to Dr. Lopez.

"Yes, if you promise to take good care of our baby girl, then we trust you."

"I promise to do that." He smiled at LeRoy, before he turned to face his wife.

"Maribel do you want to come with us?" Mrs. Lopez was drying her eyes and sniffled.

"No I can't see my baby like this. I need to build more courage first." When her husband looked like he didn't want to leave her alone, she continued.

"But you should go. Rachel obviously needs to see Santana and I really think that you should let her do that." He still looked uncertain, so LeRoy quickly cut in.

"We'll take care of your wife Dr. Lopez, don't worry about that." LeRoy smiled at him. Dr. Lopez looked at his wife and she nodded in agreement. That seemed to help him decide.

"If you need me just call my pager and I'll be right back here." Maribel nodded.

"Okay Ms. Berry, let's go." He turned to Rachel, who quickly jumped out of her father's embrace. She was halfway to the door, but then she suddenly turned around and ran back to give both of her fathers a hug and a sincere "I love you so much." before she hurriedly left. That made Mrs. Lopez cry even harder. LeRoy quickly went over to her and hugged her tight.

* * *

Rachel silently followed after Dr. Lopez to the gallery. When they arrived she couldn't see a lot of Santana, because of the chilling blankets covering most of her body, but the little she could see calmed her nerves and she finally felt like her heart stopped beating so rapidly. After getting the chance to see Santana again, Rachel quickly turned back around to look at Dr. Lopez and suddenly she found herself asking as many question as she could come up with about the procedure. Dr. Lopez was really patient and answered all her questions. After that the two of them just stood there in silence, as Rachel looked down at Santana's motionless body. When Dr. Lopez finally told her that they had to go back, she really didn't want to. All she wanted was to stay there to look after Santana. However she reluctantly complied, after Santana's father asked her for the fourth time and it was only because he looked at her again in that way that seemed to freak her out. She still didn't know what that look meant.

When they came back to Dr. Lopez's office, LeRoy was still holding Mrs. Lopez in his arms, so Dr. Lopez quickly took over for him. Then the Berry men decided that it was probably best to go home, even if Rachel didn't want to. So they ended up saying their goodbyes, despite their daughter's objections. It might have helped a little bit that Mrs. Lopez gave Rachel both her home number and cellphone number, while insisting that she could call to talk to her any time she wanted if she needed to.

On their way out to the parking lot, Rachel recognized many of the people sitting in the ER's waiting room. They were all parents or siblings of students going to her High School. She even saw Finn's mom, but she really didn't want to talk to her ex-boyfriends mother right now, so she quickly hid behind her fathers. Nobody recognized her, Hiram or LeRoy, but that was most likely only because they had more pressing things on their minds, or maybe it was because most of them usually tried to stay as far away from the Berry family as they could. Rachel relaxed a little bit, when they reached the car and started the drive back home.

* * *

When they were finally inside their own home, Rachel politely asked if she could go to her room. Her fathers wondered if she wasn't hungry, but she told them that she was feeling queasy and that she could get some food later if she felt like it. After a little bit of nagging about her needing to eat, which led nowhere, they reluctantly let her go to her room.

The first thing Rachel did was to step inside her en-suite bathroom to take a long shower to get ride of the rest of Santana's blood, that was still clinging to her body, under the clothes she had been given outside the school to cover up her nearly naked torso. When she saw the swirling red water in the shower drain, she finally broke down and started sobbing violently as she slowly slid down to the tiled floor. She had no idea how long she had been laying there, curled up in a fetal position, but when she eventually came back to herself the water had turned ice-cold and her whole body was shivering violently. After she finally managed to get up from the floor and forced her almost non responsive feet to carry her back into her bedroom, Rachel was so exhausted that she tiredly hoped that she at least now would be able to go to sleep instantly. However instead of being blessed with the darkness taking her over, she ended up having sever problems falling asleep. In the end the little sleep Rachel managed to have that night turned out to be a really restless sleep, filled with horrible nightmares about drowning in Santana's blood or by terrifying images of Santana dying in her arms.


End file.
